I had a stack of egg cartons piling up, waiting on some inspiration, and my daughter brought them to me wanting to do a project. I came up with egg carton flowers. She was thrilled! Since my little princess enjoyed her new project, I thought I’d share it with other folks who might want something new to do to keep their munchkins happy. 🙂
We gathered together our supplies: An egg carton (of course! 🙂 ), then some scissors, markers, marker stampers and some stickers that aren’t pictured below.
Egg carton flower supplies
First, I cut the top off of the egg carton, then cut between the cups. Next, I cut the cups into a smoother rounded shape around the top. Last, I went snippety snip around the cup to make the petals. The different stages of development in the picture should help fill in any confuzzlement left by my description. 🙂
From there, it was up to Princess Peachy to finish up. She smashed the petals flat with her little hand, then got to work decorating. She had a good ol’ time being creative with decorating them all sorts of different ways with the supplies we had on hand. When she was finished, we arranged them in a flower shape on a green piece of construction paper. You could glue them on, if you want, but my little one enjoyed rearranging them too much to let me glue them on.
What household item do you have overflowing, but don’t want to throw out because you think you can find some nifty way to upcycle it? Maybe I can come up with something. 🙂
During the summertime, I know alot of parents are looking for inexpensive activities to fill the days with fun. Alot of those activities are available in the great outdoors, but sometimes you might prefer a cooler way to beat the heat. There are alot of awesome programs for seeing great family movies with your munchkins this summer without going through lot of change! Here are a few summer movie deals I have found for the kiddos:
Carmike Cinemas have different promotions according to location. The one closest to me is offering a movie, drink and popcorn for just $4 total. You’ll have to look up your location for their times and promotions.
Regal Cinemas is not free, but they have $1 movies certain days during the summer at participating locations. Check the link for details, to see if your local Regal Cinema is participating, and what their specific schedule is.
With summer dawning, alot of folks are hitting the road for family vacation or visiting relatives. Since most of us are on a budget, I thought I’d share a few of the little things I do to save big when we travel.
“Penny Pinching Peach is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to Amazon.com”
We like our caffeine when we’re on road trips, so instead of stopping everywhere for drinks, I make a big jug of sweet tea (Lipton, of course!)ahead of time and put it in mason jars in the cooler. It’s extremely inexpensive, and easily poured from jar to travel cup. We also pack jars of milk and juice for the kiddos, as well as water if we’re going somewhere with questionable water quality.
Anyone who travels with kids knows that plenty of snacks are a must. I make things like cookies (Try my recipe for Healthy Oatmeal Cookies here. They travel well for a few days.) and snack mixes, plus take things like boxes of raisins, apples and bananas. I also pack some emergency treats like lollipops for when the little stinkers start howling about being stuck in the car. Since they are a treat to our kids, they work well at buying some peaceful time. We still sometimes stop for an icecream cone or some local delicacy as a treat, but we aren’t tempted to grab convenience treats for inflated prices at bathroom stops when we already have plenty of yummy goodies to munch on.
If you can, pack some sandwiches, canned goods, and breakfast items to eat for breakfasts and lunches while traveling. Also, gather up coupons for various restaurants you may stop at on your travels. Often, you can sign up for birthday clubs (see my post here: Happy Birthday Freebies) and get some really high value coupons for various restaurants just for signing up, even before your birthday comes around.
If you have pets, and know someone trustworthy nearby who also has pets, try to work out a pet sitting trade with them. You watch their pets while they travel, and they watch your pets while you travel. This way, neither of you has to actually spend any money on pet care. Just make sure to walk them through how to care for your furbabies, leave a list of the basic necessities of their care, and leave everything in plain sight that they will need to taking care of your critters.
Always look for the coupon books that are available in any tourist area, and search online for savings ahead of time at any attractions you intend to visit. You can rack up some serious savings on tickets and shopping this way.
I think most of us know to check the coupon books or make reservations online at discounted prices to save on hotels,and I’m really trying to focus on the more obscure little ways to save, but it must be mentioned. Also, if you are a government employee, in public safety or any career like that, inquire into what discounts are available to you. You may be surprised at how much of a savings some hotels will give you for those careers.
What are your favorite little tricks for saving big while traveling? Traveling with little ones, check out my post Traveling With Little Riders!
By combining sales and coupons, I try to get at least 75% off of any cosmetics that I buy, if not free. The other day I let my daughter pick two new colors for her nail polish stash, paid for 100% by $1 off any Wet & Wild product coupons. Happy mommy, happy little girl, happy pockets! 🙂
Want a few easy pointers for getting bargains on makeup? Here ya go…
Always shop ahead.
Don’t wait until you need a certain product to buy it. You don’t have to keep a huge stockpile, but if you find a great deal on a beauty item that you definitely use, go ahead and buy it.
Keep a couple of extras of any commonly used makeup or nail polish at all times, and you’ll never be forced to pay retail because you ran out of something you won’t walk out of the house without.
Don’t be stuck on one particular brand, unless necessary.
My skin is sensitive, so I have to be careful about skin products. I don’t just buy anything because it’s pennies on the dollar. For things like mascara, lip gloss, eye shadow and nail polish, though, I can get by with a variety of types & brands.
Clip all the cosmetics coupons, then watch the sales ads for chances to combine them.
This takes all of a few minutes a week while doing the rest of your coupon and sales checks, so it’s not a huge commitment. If you get store coupons for a percentage off your purchase or money off beauty items, that will give you great value when stacked with manufacturer coupons, too.
Feel beautiful and fiercely frugal, all at the same time! See how I save on buying clothes online!
My hair has been getting so heavy it’s like a torture instrument during my migraines, and I also just plain wanted a change. I really wanted layers. However, penny pinching peach that I be, I also didn’t want to pay bakoodles for a stylist, wind up with shorter hair than I want to have or any other scary scenario that was running through my stringy haired head.
I decided to research cutting my own hair into long layers.
I did some research online and became entirely overwhelmed, so made an inquiry on a homesteading site about whether anyone there had cut their own hair. I got alot of great advice, and viewed a few videos they shared. I picked the one I’ll share below that I particularly liked due to the simplicity of the method, but adapted it to be softer by taking the advice given not to pull my hair too far forward or to cut at too sharp of angles or take off too much at once to start off.
I took a risk and cut my own hair!
“Penny Pinching Peach is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to Amazon.com”
I bought a pair of decent Hair Cutting Scissors while I was out running errands, then both of my munchkins miraculously took a nap at the same time after we got home. I went to work, washing and conditioning my hair and then following the basic techniques from the video until I was fairly satisfied with the results.
It was actually pretty easy to cut my own hair, to my surprise, even for someone who had never cut human hair before! I am rather happy with the results, too, since my hair is much lighter and has more “bounce” to it. 🙂
Here is the after photo of my new hair cut!
(Excuse the cruddy selfies, but noone over the age of 4 was around to take a before or for a few days to take a photo after.) What do you think?
After I cut my own layers
Have you ever cut your own hair or someone else’s, without formal training?
Would you like to try? It isn’t for everyone, so please don’t blame me if you try it and wind up looking like a hairless chihuahua with those craaaaaazzzzzy sprigs sprouting off the top of your noggin! 🙂
I’m pretty artistic by nature, and can draw, cut and trim paper, fabric and other materials accurately with ease, so that made me a little more comfortable attempting my own hair cut. If I couldn’t draw a stick figure or cut in a straight line or curve at will, I would swallow my penny pinching tendencies and cough up the dough for a professional hair cut every single time. It’s not worth winding up in a book like this one full of hilarious memes of the world’s worst hair cuts! to save a few bucks! 🙂
Also, please note that on my first attempt I didn’t do anything super drastic. Keep in mind that you can always cut more hair off if your hair isn’t quite the shape you want or as short as you’d like, but you can’t just tape those locks back on. 🙂
Here’s the video I used as a sort of guideline, if anyone wants to watch it themselves.
I don’t know this person. Someone on Facebook shared the video with me, among others, and this one I liked because it was so easy to follow.
In honor of Dr. Seuss’ birthday on March 2, we decided to read his whimsical books in a nook with a look for ideas to cook up for activities to do that go along with the stories. Today we read “One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish”. That is one of my munchkins ‘ favorites! I didn’t want to do a bunch of printing and searching activities yesterday, so I just free styled it. Maybe it will give someone else some inspiration.
“Penny Pinching Peach is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to Amazon.com”
One fish, two fish was simple. I drew a large one and a large two on each side of the picture with the word fish, and let her draw. She decided to go rogue on that one, so I’ll skip a picture, but she did understand the concept. LOL
Red fish, Blue fish
For red fish, blue fish, it was pretty easy, too. I grabbed some red and blue markers, using the appropriate colors to title and illustrate a coloring page. My little artist colored them opposite colors, but she enjoyed herself. 🙂
So that it wasn’t just about the fish on the cover, I chose another of my daughter’s favorite parts of the book for the closing activity.
By the light of a star, by the light of the moon…
I drew a moon and star, sketched a rudimentary sheep, grabbed a bunch of cotton balls, rolled pieces of tape and stuck them to each, and turned my little princess loose. Glue would be easier, but we have issues with glue, curls and an independent streak. 😉 My kiddo was pretty tickled with the results of her project!
Is anyone else doing any fun activities in honor of Dr. Seuss’ birthday? Am I the only lifelong fan of his books? I was actually excited to read them to my babies, since I enjoyed them so much growing up! 🙂 If you want to get your own copy to do these fun activities with, just head on over here: One Fish Two Fish Red Fish Blue Fish
Arrrr, mateys!! We’re working on the alphabet, and you’re welcome to sail along!
My little girl was in a piratey kind of mood when her photo was taken with this particular preschool project, so I just floated with it. 🙂
I decided to let my little pirate do a letter C word search.
I took a blank sheet of paper, made several bubble letter Cs, drew a few pieces of candy and a few cookies, then added a bunch of random swirls & stars to make it a bit tricky. I also made a box in the lower corner as her “code” to help her know how many letter Cs were hidden and how many of each of the sweet things that started with the letter C she needed to find.
The sailing orders were simple. Find all of the letter Cs and color them.
When you find one in the picture, color one in your code so that you know when you find them all. Do the same thing with the pieces of candy and cookies, which are the words I was using to demonstrate the C sound for her that day.
This would work with any letter and any simple pictures you wanted to use with that letter, obviously.
My wee matey had fun with this project, as you can see from her piratical expression, and I’m sure your little ones would too. 🙂
My family loves to eat yogurt, but I’ve ran into a couple of problems with the pre-flavored yogurts available at the store.
First off, they are getting too stinkin’ expensive for my taste! Second, there is a ton of sugar, artificial dyes and extra junk I can’t even pronounce added into most of them, and I’m not too crazy about that when I’m trying to make a healthy choice by eating yogurt in the first place.
So, being the penny pinching peach that I be 🙂 , I decided to start experimenting with making my own flavored yogurt, starting with the big (and much cheaper!) tubs of plain yogurt.
The first thing I tried was a recipe I found for chocolate chip cookie dough yogurt. It was just a couple of scoops of plain yogurt (Greek or regular works, although the recipe asked for Greek), a couple of scoops of creamy peanut butter, a sprinkling of vanilla extract and a small handful of chocolate chips. It was surprisingly good!
Next, I used some of my son’s baby food to flavor some of that same plain yogurt. Both of my children were crazy about it! It actually tasted very similar to the store bought fruit flavored yogurts, just slightly less sweet because there was no sugar added. This one is 100% healthy and sugar free, which is fantastic since too much sugar makes my munchkins act like they’ve been transformed into the Energizer bunny until all hours of the night. 🙂
Banana baby food and a generous dollop of peanut butter mixed into yogurt was a definite hit, with both my daughter and myself! Some other baby food flavors I’d suggest: strawberry banana, apple blueberry (sounds weird, but my kids loved that one), peaches, banana, apricot & mixed fruit…pretty much anything fruity that sounds yummy to you will work.
My husband brought me a yogurt mix treat the other day, bringing with it more yogurt mix-in inspiration. Try almond slivers, dark chocolate shavings or chips and shredded coconut. Can we say delicious? Ooooo, yeahhh! 😉
A winning flavor is mashed banana and peanut butter mixed together and then mixed into your yogurt.
Cinnamon, honey and raisins makes for a different twist, with flavors reminiscent of rice pudding.
Does anyone else flavor their own yogurt? What’s your favorite?
With the holiday season over, and the Christmas themed crafts no longer an anchor for our preschool activities, it’s back to ordinary projects for us. I decided to have my 4 year old review her alphabet a little differently, using random things from around the house, to make sure she really recognizes and can write each upper and lower case letter well.We’re a few letters in now, but I’m sharing what we did for the letter A, as well as what Baby Boy did for “baby school” while she was hard at work. 🙂
My hubby had brought home a newspaper with all those lovely coupon inserts, and there were some advertisements in there with large, classic block letters. I got out Princess Peach’s current preschool book and had her look at the letter A pages she had done previously. She then filled her dry erase board with as many upper and lower case (also known as mommy and baby) letter As as she could. After that, it was on to her fun project, with her book and dry erase board as her guide…
I gave her the advertisement page, and told her to find and cut out as many of the letter A as she could find. For every five letters, she would get a sticker. She had a blast hunting for and cutting out her letters and cashing them in for her stickers! 🙂
Of course, little brother wanted in on the fun as well, so Mommy pulled out some extra large animal flash cards for
Animal Identification and Sounds
him once sister was to the cutting stage. I set him up in the high chair next to her, gave him the flash cards and had him hold each one up and I’d tell him the animal and animal sound. He’d repeat them to me with interest, and sometimes tell me what sounds they made before he even held them up to show me. This kept him stimulated and happily learning with sister instead of trying to steal all of her letters. 🙂
All of this took place in our kitchen while I was doing dishes, by the way. I can’t get anything done if I can’t multi task at least part of the time! 🙂
Does anyone else use random household items for educational activities? It definitely appeals to the penny pinching, hate-to-waste-anything side of me, I have to admit! 🙂
My 4 year old loves crafts and Christmas, so I’ve had to come up with alot of random crafty things for her to do that are Christmas related. One thing she has especially enjoyed is beading. She’s done ornaments, as well as making bracelets and necklaces galore. We even made a camo bracelet for her baby brother. I also had to come up with a way to include her 19 month old brother in her new favorite activity, which I’ll share in a second. 🙂
Concentrating on beading
“Penny Pinching Peach is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to Amazon.com”
She made a few candy canes and a wreath to hang on our little Christmas tree. I just twirl one end of a Creativity Street Stetems/Pipe Cleaners 12″ X 4mm 100-Piece Assorted Colors
to hold the Pony Beads Multi Color 9mm 1000 Pcs in Bag
on and shape the finished beads into whatever we are making. She enjoys making a pattern by laying out beads in the color scheme we are going to use, and then using that to remind her of the order her colors should go on her pipe cleaner.
Her brother was jealous after she’d made bracelets for herself and me, so I came up with a camo themed bracelet idea. He wears it proudly, and Daddy isn’t the least bit bothered by his son wearing a camo bracelet like he might be of Princess Peach’s suggestion of purple and pink for her brother’s bracelet. 😉
Camo bracelet
Of course, I couldn’t leave the little guy out of all of this Christmas fun! I was looking at his little face, which he would’ve stuffed with all of the pretty candy colored beads, and had an AHA!! moment. I strapped him in his highchair, handed him a pipe cleaner and dumped a handful of multigrain Cheerios on his tray. Tada! Edible beads for baby! He was thrilled to be doing what big sister was doing, and I was happy that both of my children were safely entertained. 🙂
Baby beading Cheerios
This is a super cheap and easy activity that will keep Princess Peach busy for hours, and my little squirt happily engaged for as long as 20 or 30 minutes. Anyone who has ever cared for small children 24/7 knows that a fun activity like that is priceless!
What are you keeping the little ones in your life busy with during the holiday season? Need another idea? Check out my popular Salt Dough Christmas Ornaments!
while I was out running errands, then both of my munchkins miraculously took a nap at the same time after we got home. I went to work, washing and conditioning my hair and then following the basic techniques from the video until I was fairly satisfied with the results.
to save a few bucks! 🙂
Penny Pinching Peach 